‘Urban’ sounds: it’s time to stop using this hackneyed term for black music

‘Urban” is a word used across the music industry to include R&B, hip-hop, soul and now grime. It is no coincidence that these forms of black music are lumped together into one category. Sam Taylor, an executive from the music publishing firm Kobalt, reignited the debate about the term by saying: “I hate and despise the word ‘urban’.” Not only is urban an obviously wrong category, but it is also born out of racial stereotyping of black communities.

It is undeniable that most black people in the US and the UK live in cities. Half of all black people in the UK live in London and half of all ethnic minorities live in the capital, Manchester or Birmingham. Unsurprisingly, much black music is strongly linked to London.

Motown is inseparable from Detroit; the east coast-west coast beef was as much about the sounds of Los Angeles and New York as the personalities; and the popularity of grime artists such as Skepta and Stormzy is rooted in the genre’s representation of British inner cities. But “urban” is not used to represent all the music from the city, or punk and contemporary Asian music would be included.

“Urban” is rooted in US sociologist Elijah Anderson’s notion of the “iconic ghetto”, where the image of the streets, the hood or the endz dominates how we understand black communities. “Urban” stands in for black and comes with all the same stereotypes. This erases the diversity of the black experience and of the music. Black music may now be performed in the city, but its roots lie in reggae from the hills of Jamaica, blues from the deep south and drumbeats from African villages.

Defining black music by its location allows for gentrification of the genres. It allowed Ed Sheeran to be named the “most important act in black and urban music” in BBC Radio 1Xtra’s power list in 2014.

There is a long, distinguished history of black artists’ work being appropriated for mainstream success, with Elvis Presley’s hijacking of blues being the most notable example. Collapsing black music into “urban” reinforces racial stereotypes and helps white artists profit from them.